The Best Lightsaber Fight We’ll Never See, According To Star Wars Stunt Coordinator Nick Gillard
Lucasfilm By Joshua Meyer/May 21, 2022 12:01 pm EST
“The Phantom Menace” isn’t the most popular “Star Wars” movie, and in a lot of ways, the long-awaited prequel and first theatrical series entry since “Return of the Jedi” wound up being upstaged by “The Matrix” and its revolutionary action techniques in 1999. However, despite its many flaws, “Phantom Menace” does feature one of the most memorable lightsaber fights in “Star Wars” history. It’s the two-on-one duel that pits the Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) and his master, Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson), against the double-bladed lightsaber-wielding Sith Lord Darth Maul (Ray Park).
The piece of music, “Duel of the Fates” by John Williams, goes a long way toward selling the scene, but according to Nick Gillard — one of the stunt coordinators who worked behind the scenes staging fights for the prequel trilogy — there’s an even better “Star Wars” lightsaber fight fans never got to see. Gillard spoke to Entertainment Weekly in 2019, the debut year of the sequel trilogy ender, “The Rise of Skywalker,” and the 20th anniversary of “The Phantom Menace.” In the process, he revealed that “Revenge of the Sith” almost featured a fight where Obi-Wan would’ve gone toe to toe with six of General Grievous’ bodyguards at once.
The Best Lightsaber Fight We’ll Never See, According To Star Wars Stunt Coordinator Nick Gillard
Lucasfilm
By Joshua Meyer/May 21, 2022 12:01 pm EST
“The Phantom Menace” isn’t the most popular “Star Wars” movie, and in a lot of ways, the long-awaited prequel and first theatrical series entry since “Return of the Jedi” wound up being upstaged by “The Matrix” and its revolutionary action techniques in 1999. However, despite its many flaws, “Phantom Menace” does feature one of the most memorable lightsaber fights in “Star Wars” history. It’s the two-on-one duel that pits the Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) and his master, Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson), against the double-bladed lightsaber-wielding Sith Lord Darth Maul (Ray Park).
The piece of music, “Duel of the Fates” by John Williams, goes a long way toward selling the scene, but according to Nick Gillard — one of the stunt coordinators who worked behind the scenes staging fights for the prequel trilogy — there’s an even better “Star Wars” lightsaber fight fans never got to see. Gillard spoke to Entertainment Weekly in 2019, the debut year of the sequel trilogy ender, “The Rise of Skywalker,” and the 20th anniversary of “The Phantom Menace.” In the process, he revealed that “Revenge of the Sith” almost featured a fight where Obi-Wan would’ve gone toe to toe with six of General Grievous’ bodyguards at once.
The piece of music, “Duel of the Fates” by John Williams, goes a long way toward selling the scene, but according to Nick Gillard — one of the stunt coordinators who worked behind the scenes staging fights for the prequel trilogy — there’s an even better “Star Wars” lightsaber fight fans never got to see. Gillard spoke to Entertainment Weekly in 2019, the debut year of the sequel trilogy ender, “The Rise of Skywalker,” and the 20th anniversary of “The Phantom Menace.” In the process, he revealed that “Revenge of the Sith” almost featured a fight where Obi-Wan would’ve gone toe to toe with six of General Grievous’ bodyguards at once.
Lightsaber overkill
Evidently, the decision to have the scene play out this way was one that came about at the last minute. The aforementioned Nick Gillard said by way of EW that Ewan McGregor underwent weeks of fight choreography training to prepare for the six-on-one duel with Grievous’ bodyguards and Obi-Wan. Time concerns and the inessential nature of the fight with respect to the overall narrative led director George Lucas to devise a quicker end to the bodyguards. As Gillard put it:
“It was the most complicated fight we ever did, and George said, ‘I’m really sorry, I’m going to drop a container on five of them!’”
